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Countries that let anyone in?

Are there any (livable 🥺) countries that basically allow anyone to become a citizen? Specifically where an English speaker could get by.

Edit: by allowing anyone I mean poor people with no skills.

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  • Well, "liveable" is going to be somewhat-subjective.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_border

    Examples of open borders

    Svalbard

    Uniquely, the Norwegian special territory of Svalbard is an entirely visa-free zone. No person requires a visa or residence permit and anyone may live and work in Svalbard indefinitely, regardless of citizenship. The Svalbard Treaty grants treaty nationals equal right of abode as Norwegian nationals. So far, non-treaty nationals have been admitted visa-free as well. "Regulations concerning rejection and expulsion from Svalbard" are in force on a non-discriminatory basis. Grounds for exclusion include lack of means of support, and violation of laws or regulations.[52][53][54] Same-day visa-free transit at Oslo Airport is possible when travelling on non-stop flights to Svalbard.

    That's not citizenship, but it's living and working there without restriction, which is probably about as good as someone's going to get in the present day. But it's probably colder than most people would like.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Svalbard

    Approximately 60% of the archipelago is covered with glaciers, and the islands feature many mountains and fjords. The archipelago has an Arctic climate, although with significantly higher temperatures than other areas at the same latitude. The flora has adapted to take advantage of the long period of midnight sun to compensate for the polar night. Many seabirds use Svalbard as a breeding ground, and it is home to polar bears, reindeer, the Arctic fox, and certain marine mammals. Seven national parks and 23 nature-reserves cover two-thirds of the archipelago, protecting the largely untouched fragile environment.

    EDIT: And income looks pretty solid, even by Western standards:

    In 2006, the average income for economically active people was 494,700 kroner, 23% higher than on the mainland.

    Converting to 2006 USD and then rolling forward inflation to December 2023, that'd be ~$110,463.54/year.

    But part of the reason that they're gonna be paying that is because the people living there are gonna have to be living in polar twilight for a hefty chunk of the year.

    • Most remote areas also have a lot higher cost of living since most things need to be shipped into the extreme environment.

    • Yeah but do they have highspeed internet?

      • When it isn't being cut, they have submarine cables to Norway.

        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Svalbard_Undersea_Cable_System

        The Svalbard Undersea Cable System is a twin submarine communications cable which connects Svalbard to the mainland of Norway. The two optical fiber cable consist of two segments, from Harstad to Breivika in Andøy, and from Breivika to Hotellneset near Longyearbyen in Svalbard. The segments from Harstad to Breivika are 74 and 61 kilometers (46 and 38 mi) long, respectively, and the segments from Breivika to Hotellneset 1,375 and 1,339 kilometers (854 and 832 mi). Each consists of eight fiber pairs and there are twenty optical communications repeaters on each segment. Each segment has a speed of 10 gigabits per second (Gb/s), with a future potential capacity of 2,500 Gbit/s. The system is now the sole telecommunications link to the archipelago.

        There's apparently 5G service:

        https://www.lifeinnorway.net/5g-norway/

        The company began Scandinavia's first 5G pilot back in November 2018, conducted Norway's first 5G video call, and launched the world's northernmost 5G pilot in Svalbard. Telenor chose Nordic company Ericsson over Chinese firm Huawei to supply the critical infrastructure for the rollout.

        I don't know whether Starlink orbital paths can cover that far north.

        googles

        Apparently so, and they started service about five months ago.

        https://satprnews.com/2023/07/09/starlink-launches-in-svalbard-a-new-era-of-internet-connectivity-in-the-arctic/

        Starlink Launches in Svalbard: A New Era of Internet Connectivity in the Arctic.

    • Hmm. Though that being said, global warming will cause glaciers to retreat, so it'll probably be more-ice-free in the future than it is now.

      googles

      And it looks like Svalbard, in particular, is warming up quickly.

      https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-63387233

      Experts from the Norwegian Polar Institute are among those who calculate it is heating six times faster than the global average.

      The consensus is that the temperature in Svalbard has jumped 4C in the past 50 years.

    • Also, in general, if you have legal residence long-term in a country, most countries do permit a route to obtain citizenship. Norway does appear to do this too (though it's not a guaranteed right, and you need to learn Norwegian as part of that process). Thing is, I don't know whether legal residence in Svalbard -- which is a Norwegian territory, but not part of Norway proper -- counts as legal residence in Norway for naturalization purposes, and I could very much believe that that is not the case.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norwegian_nationality_law

      Foreigners may become Norwegian nationals by application after residing in the country for at least seven of the previous ten years, while holding a work or residence permit valid for at least one year. Applicants must be at least 12 years old, demonstrate proficiency in the Norwegian or Sami language (or alternatively complete 300 hours of Norwegian language courses), intend to reside in Norway permanently, pass a good character requirement, and not have a criminal record.[11]

      Thinking of an analog, I know that in the US, American Samoa is unusual in that while it is a US territory, American Samoa wanted to run their own immigration policy (because there are people in (non-American) Samoa who they wanted to be able to move in). Both the US and American Samoa were willing for American Samoa to be a US territory, but the US wasn't willing to have American Samoa just be a back door to general entry to the US if they had different immigration policy. Normally, in an American territory -- like Puerto Rico, say -- the residents are American citizens. However, because of this independent immigration policy that American Samoa runs, based on the arrangement that the US and American Samoa worked out, American Samoans are not actually American citizens -- they are American nationals. While generally they can live and work in the rest of the US, just the fact that American Samoa is okay with someone moving to American Samoa and has the right to let people in as they choose doesn't necessarily mean that the same person can use that status to just bounce from there to legal status in the rest of the US.

      It wouldn't surprise me if Norway has similar restrictions on people bouncing via legal residence in Svalbard to broader Norway, because the situations are somewhat-similar.

      EDIT: Yup.

      https://www.lifeinnorway.net/living-on-svalbard/

      It's also important to understand that time spent living in Svalbard does not count towards residence in Norway. That means that if you've lived in Svalbard for two years, those two years will not count towards a permanent residence application in Norway.

    • Iirc, if you die there, your body has to be evacuated to somewhere else.

      • googles

        Apparently, they don't let people be buried there anymore, because it's all permafrost, so the bodies don't decay. This says that they sometimes permit people to be cremated and have their ashes kept in the graveyard there.

        https://www.iflscience.com/it-is-against-the-law-to-die-in-this-town-for-very-good-reason-46724

        The notion it's illegal to die in Longyearbyen may have first started when it was discovered that in 1950 bodies within the town's cemetery were not decomposing due to the permafrost. As a result, it was believed deadly viruses within the bodies could be kept alive and possibly re-infect the living population as the permafrost thawed.

        It sounds like a nightmare scenario, but it's one that has already played out elsewhere. In August 2016, there was an anthrax outbreak in northern Siberia, with one boy being killed and around 90 others hospitalized. Furthermore, 2,300 reindeer died from the disease.

        The most recent outbreak prior to this took place in 1941. The 2016 outbreak occurred during a heatwave in the region, leading officials to conclude that a reindeer killed by anthrax had thawed out, causing the virus to be released into the environment.

        In 1950, officials in Longyearbyen were worried that a similar thing could happen with bacteria and viruses hiding in the residents of their graveyard.

        Recently, samples of the Spanish Influenza were found in the lungs of victims of the disease that had been preserved in the permafrost of Alaska, stored there since 1918. Traces were also found in Longyearbyen itself, from a person who died during the 1917 outbreak.

        Though it's unlikely that bodies in Longyearbyen thawing out would cause an outbreak of Spanish Flu, a team of scientists studying the virus in 1998 took extra precautions just in case. While extracting samples from the graves, they wore modified spacesuits and ensured that the tissue did not thaw out before it reached a specialized facility in the US.

        "Potential viruses from the bodies that died during the Spanish flu is not a worry in Longyearbyen," Carlsen told IFLScience. The results of those scientific studies can be read about here.

        "It is not illegal to die on Svalbard, that happens from time to time, but as a main rule you cannot be buried here. However, in some special cases and for people who have a special connection or history to Longyearbyen, you can be buried in an urn at the cemetery."

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